Gayle Adlam

Welcome to our second collection of Standard Bank KwaZulu-Natal Top Business Women.

The vision of the Standard Bank KwaZulu-Natal Top Business Women initiative is to celebrate the achievements of women in business and in society through a range of media – webinars, video, photography, and the written word.

Through this initiative, we aim to place some of our women role models in the public eye and to honour their extraordinary successes. The theme for 2021 is ‘women inspiring women’ and we have had no shortage of amazing stories to share and to be inspired by.

Each story is important enough to be shared, and each person needs to be heard! These women are to be found making a difference in the fields of farming, medicine, health and wellness, community, business development, law, entertainment, environment and the arts, amongst many other life-calling (and changing) jobs and careers. In addition, apart from their incredible accomplishments, they identify themselves as wives, mothers, daughters, sisters ...the list is endless.

The team at KwaZulu-Natal Top Business have to thank each of the women featured for the time that they have offered us and the insights that they have shared. Without their willingness to tell their stories, this publication and our accompanying video series would not be possible.

All the women were interviewed and asked the same questions:

• What are your business and/or community achievements?

• How did you get to where you are today?

• Who or what has motivated or inspired you and why?

• What challenges have you experienced and how have you overcome these?

• What are your future goals?

• What advice would you give to young women who are following in your path?

Some of the key themes that emerged, amongst others, are:

• Being female in a male dominated world

• The importance of loving yourself

• Being true to yourself

• Follow your passions

• Never be afraid of learning

• Not letting your failures define you

• To keep striving amidst challenges

• Surround yourself with your tribe

• Striving for balance

Each of the women featured have travelled amazing journeys, have stood firm and are an inspiration to other women (and men). We are sure that you will enjoy reading their stories and watching their videos.

We also extend our gratitude to the various people who have facilitated the process and helped with setting up interviews, handling queries, and writing profiles.

A special thank you to our photographer, Nic Carroll, for the beautiful black and white portraits, which are featured in this book. He made sure that we all enjoyed the sessions in front of the camera.

Another special thank you to Alan Patrick, who has spent many hours filming interviews, as well as editing the footage to produce the videos that are available on our website: www.kzntopbusiness.com and on our YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/c/KZNTopBusiness

This year we introduced each of the women in a three-part webinar series, which are available on the YouTube platform as well. Thanks also to Marlene Powell who facilitated each of the webinars. We hope that the series will continue to inspire other women to achieve their dreams.

Our sincere thanks go to the team at Standard Bank KwaZulu-Natal for their support of the KwaZuluNatal Top Business Women: IT CAN BE.